Part One of Two parts.
I cover global nuclear issues in my but sometimes a story hits close to my home city of Seattle, Washington. The Puget Sound Naval Shipyard (PSNS) is located in Bremerton, near Seattle. In the early 1990s, a system was developed at PSNS to recycle old submarines and cruisers which were mothballed at Bremerton when they reached the end of their operational lives.
At the Shipyard, the nuclear reactors that power some of the vessels are "defueled" and have the reactor vessels and their compartments removed. The reactor components are then "encased" and barged down to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in south central Washington State on the Columbia River. The remains of the ships are cut up for scrap and recycling.
Over a hundred nuclear subs and eight nuclear cruisers have been disposed of in this way. Planning has been underway for some time for the Shipyard to dispose of the nuclear aircraft carrier Enterprise sometime in 2017. This would be the biggest job ever undertaken by the Shipyard. However, recently the U.S. Navy has been considering the possibility of opening the Enterprise job to commercial bidders which would inject an element of competition into what has been a monopoly for nuclear naval vessel disposal.
This possibility appeared in May of 2014 when the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) sent out a request for information to commercial firms about how they would dismantle the Enterprise aside from the nuclear reactor and propulsion system. Despite repeated requests for more information, the Navy has refused to explain its intentions further than issuing a short statement in early May of 2015. "To ensure the best use of resources, the Navy is currently looking at options for recycling of USS Enterprise (CVN 65), including the possibility of commercial recycling," NAVSEA said May 4 in the statement. "All reactor compartments and radioactive systems will be disposed of by [Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and the Intermediate Maintenance Facility]. No final decisions have been made."
Non-Navy sources have speculated that there are probably two major reasons that the Navy is considering commercial firms for the Enterprise project. Apparently, the Navy is concerned about the estimate for the Shipyard to do the job. In order to carry out the entire recycling task at Bremerton, the Enterprise would have to be towed from Virginia, around South American and up to Washington State. This alone would cost more than the Navy had budgeted for the whole project.
A second big concern is the fact that the Shipyard is used to maintain active Naval vessels in the North Pacific and it is quite busy. In addition, there is already a backlog of nuclear submarines lined up for demolition at the Shipyard. Adding the Enterprise to the workload might well overtax the already busy Shipyard's capacity.
The Enterprise is currently at the Newport News Shipbuilding (NNS) yard in Virginia where it was built. In 2013, the Enterprise was moved from the Norfolk Naval Base to NNS to have the nuclear fuel removed and some of the equipment and components stripped. This job was planned in conjunction with PSNS but there has been a conflict over just how much of the Enterprise will be removed before it would be sent to Puget Sound. PSNA wanted it to arrive basically intact while NNS wanted to remove major sections before it left Virginia.
(See Part Two)
Puget Sound Naval Shipyard:
